Ah, 4H has the unforgiving paradigm of continuing the story with little direction. If I didn't beat my head against countless 8-bit RPGs, I wouldn't have known what to do after the first dungeon.
Everything the most minor character says is important! I knew almost instantly that I had to wander the desert for an hour to find out where to go next.
It actually plays a LOT like NES era Dragon Quest or maybe Final Fantasy games.
4H is weird. The battle system is stupendously simple, but that simplicity covers up a deceptively difficult game. A "I want to slam this DS into the wall you fucking cheap fuckers" difficulty at times. Where you just look at the screen and say "Well what the fuck could I have possibly done to survive that?". Round 1, Healer heals, Boss attacks for 50% damage. Round 2, Boss attacks for the other 50%, lol u dead. And then there are the parts I mention where the game loves to give you just the one party member, and these problems are worsened. Oh yeah, and all the moments where you have no clue at all where to really go. I'm not sure if that's an intended old school throwback or just shitty design. Probably a little of both.
Still though, I really do like the game. There's just something deliciously charming about it, and I'm also one of the few people who actually like this art style.
The Wolfman on
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
Dragon Crest, Thievery, and Frog Drop worked the same way, but Dragon Crest was the least annoying to max.
Or, you could just use Steiner and cast Shock, or reflect-2x Flares from Vivi, or the aforementioned MP Attack with the Ultima Weaopon. I guess you could use Limit Glove too, but meh.
Ah, 4H has the unforgiving paradigm of continuing the story with little direction. If I didn't beat my head against countless 8-bit RPGs, I wouldn't have known what to do after the first dungeon.
Everything the most minor character says is important! I knew almost instantly that I had to wander the desert for an hour to find out where to go next.
It actually plays a LOT like NES era Dragon Quest or maybe Final Fantasy games.
Okay, that pushes me towards "get it"
But what about gameplay? All I know is there's hats that are jobs and auto-targeting. How does it all work? Do you upgrade the jobs or is it more FF3 where you just have everything you'll ever have with them? How do battles go beyond auto-targeting? And also anything else that's important.
Ah, 4H has the unforgiving paradigm of continuing the story with little direction. If I didn't beat my head against countless 8-bit RPGs, I wouldn't have known what to do after the first dungeon.
Everything the most minor character says is important! I knew almost instantly that I had to wander the desert for an hour to find out where to go next.
It actually plays a LOT like NES era Dragon Quest or maybe Final Fantasy games.
Okay, that pushes me towards "get it"
But what about gameplay? All I know is there's hats that are jobs and auto-targeting. How does it all work? Do you upgrade the jobs or is it more FF3 where you just have everything you'll ever have with them? How do battles go beyond auto-targeting? And also anything else that's important.
You upgrade the crowns (hats) using gems that are dropped at random by enemies. Gems are also your primary source of money, as well as the way you upgrade gear. So it's a balancing act -- do you get rid of gems for money, do you upgrade gear, or do you upgrade your crown for a new ability?
Crowns have 4 levels (0, 1, 2, 3) and each one adds a new ability, and is harder to unlock. Abilities are only usable by the crown they come from -- no unlocking steal then switching away from the Bandit Crown, for example. You get new crowns by hitting parts of the story, as well as some secret ones you get from bonus dungeons and minigames.
Yes, the game uses auto-targeting. Attacks either hit the front or rear row (swords are front, spears are back, etc), and the game will be semi-intelligent when attacking -- your team will gang up on one target, for example. Beneficial spells are the same way -- your white mage will hit the most hurt target automatically.
There is an auto-battle system, which allows you to select a move with each person then watch as they do it. It's mostly useful for random battles, as it's very fast. What I typically do is have one character as a white mage and the other attacking. When I get back to a full party, it will likely be 2 guys stealing/searching for gems, 1 attacking, 1 curing.
Magic is class independent. As long as you're holding a magic book, you can cast. White / Black mages get bonuses to the respective stat, self-chargeup abilities, and a discount to the AP cost to cast spells.
AP is the turn system, and is kinda sorta nothing like SMT's system. Every turn you get 1 AP. You can boost (defend) to avoid spending one. Spells, for example, require 2 AP, so you have to wait a turn between casting... unless you're a white / black mage. There's higher level spells -- Fira, for example, is 3 AP, not 2. Ethers restore AP in this. There is no Mana system.
All in all, this game feels like it could have been a NES Final Fantasy game, with 3d graphics similar to the FF3/FF4 DS ports.
I don't know if this will entice or repulse people... but the combat actually kind of feels like XIII to me. It's ridiculously fast to punch in your attacks, and the game handles the targeting for you. And if you set up the auto battle right, it basically plays itself. Which I reckon people will scoff at, but it's also really only to be used for the mindless stuff like farming, and not for the real tough fights.
The Wolfman on
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
Beneficial spells are the same way -- your white mage will hit the most hurt target automatically.
However as I recall there is some dispute as to how good a job this does. You could have a warrior with tons of HP and really high defense, able to take a few more hits, and then a thief with just a couple HP who is near death, but the WM decides to heal the warrior because he's missing 300 HP instead of 100.
Or perhaps it was vice versa, and it goes on percentage of HP missing, which could still get you in trouble. Either way, has this been a problem for you 4H players?
Also, you guys say that it's really fast to punch in your attacks, but how fast is the battle system in general? Are there little cutscenes of the enemies flying in, and each attack has a 3 second lead time, and slow unskippable victory dances?
I've been keeping my characters fairly close in level, so it's not been an issue. Anything that could kill me fast enuogh that I can't outheal it, well, healing isn't really an issue at that point. The troll boss comes to mind -- he was doing this AOE hit that was 2-3 shotting my party.
Anyway, as far as I can tell, it heals the target with the lowest current HP. So say you have:
Tank: 99/100 HP
White Mage: 69/70 HP
Bandit: 70/90 HP
The white mage gets the heal. But that's ok, since the other two won't be in any danger of dying due to damage (whereas the white mage very well may be). And these are all theoretical numbers, as my characters are all +/- 20 HP with each other right now.
I understand it gets harder later, but, right now, not an issue.
Also, you guys say that it's really fast to punch in your attacks, but how fast is the battle system in general? Are there little cutscenes of the enemies flying in, and each attack has a 3 second lead time, and slow unskippable victory dances?
About as fast as your average SNES FF game, maybe faster. Dragon Quest this ain't. Shit gets done. You swing, numbers pop up, enemy does a brief spin, more numbers pop up. Somebody does an AE attack or cure, it's one giant spell effect and 4 numbers.
There's also a text log on the bottom of the screen narrating the action DQ style, but if I have any complaint, is that the combat maybe moves just a bit too fast for it. Damage numbers only stick around for half a second before the next ones pop up.
So basically, a battle turn goes like this: Tap 1 button for each party member telling them what to do. Battle starts, the party and enemies do their thing, and 5-10 seconds later, you're back in the menu for round 2.
All of the old school Dragon Quest style gameplay, with the speed and brevity of a Final Fantasy game. Hell, this is how the DQ games should be.
The Wolfman on
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
Confirmed: They fixed the healing AI. My black mage was at 57 HP (roughtly 80%), my Bandit was at 60 (Roughly 50%), and the whitemage healed the bandit.
I want the next FF game to have FFIX's combat but just ten times faster.
So...Lost Odyssey?
I'm game.
Lost Odyssey was a good game, but I would hardly refer to the combat as being fast. Also, it's not anything like FFIX's. It's not ATB, it a has a fairly crucial timing mechanic, and probably some other shit I've forgotten.
Still stuck playing Sazh and Vanille, no potions, no gil to buy potions and stuck in a stupid Eidolon battle. I cant get the gestalt meter to go up quickly with just Sazh and Vanille healing. We die way too fast as Ravager/Ravager. I give up...
I started off liking this game alot, and it was a downhill slide from there.
Skull2185 on
Everyone has a price. Throw enough gold around and someone will risk disintegration.
You know, there's a hint on that battle if you use libra. You don't have to go Ravager/Ravager. If I recall it correctly, Gestalt bar goes up on that fight when you BUFF someone. Or was it Debuff? Anyway, you're doing it wrong. You're not supposed to go Rav/Rav there.
EDIT: Yeah, just confirmed it. Every time you buff it counts towards your Gestalt. Just buff up (do you have Haste? It helps a lot!) and then go to town with Rav/Rav. If you need healing drop to Syn/Med or Rav/Med and you should be fine. I think Odin was more tougher than this one but lots of people have trouble here too.
I hope they tone down on the debuffs, too, or at least make the system more intuitive. There were like 13 of them, and it was a pain in the ass to remember what symbol was what.
Really? I found it rather simple. Most of the buffs/debuffs were in a set. You could tell what was what just by looking at the symbol and checking if there was an up arrow or a down arrow.
It could be that my lack of a high definition tv is limiting me...
So 4H, I'm guessing the 4 people you start out with are the only main characters. I'm scared about giving items to other party members in fear that they will leave my group and never come back... with all my shit.
Edit: Also are pheonix downs only droppable off monsters? Do I have to run to an inn everytime I run out?
So 4H, I'm guessing the 4 people you start out with are the only main characters. I'm scared about giving items to other party members in fear that they will leave my group and never come back... with all my shit.
Yup, they do. They pretty much leave after the next boss fight you have, and only one actually leaves instantly after the fight, so you typically have time to empty their pockets.
If you're looking to play it safe:
Take Kirijh's (or whatever the moon guy's name is) stuff just before you fight the sand worm, since he's leaving right after. And for god's sake, don't give him the earth sword the worm drops.
The Wolfman on
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
I hope they tone down on the debuffs, too, or at least make the system more intuitive. There were like 13 of them, and it was a pain in the ass to remember what symbol was what.
Really? I found it rather simple. Most of the buffs/debuffs were in a set. You could tell what was what just by looking at the symbol and checking if there was an up arrow or a down arrow.
It could be that my lack of a high definition tv is limiting me...
Could very well be it. I play on a SD TV as well and have a lot of trouble distinguishing between things Pain and Fog. That plus being a little colorblind and I sometimes can't tell whether I have a buff or its corresponding debuff on me.
No idea why there's such a big difference. I like the part around :45 in the FF4 one when the camera makes a perfect stop and pans away like a first year 3D art student's project.
Was Chronicles equivalent released in Japan before Anthology's? Because it was the latter of the 2 here, which makes it's lesser quality FMVs even harder to understand.
So, have the final big two roleplaying games have now been released for the DS platform? If so, very interesting to compare them, especially since they're now from the same company (yet different teams, I guess).
DQ9 technically innovates with cel shading on the DS, and 4H has anti-aliasing. Both use a very special color palette to create atmosphere, but 4H takes it to the extreme (including the perspective). 4H also styles their interface to fit, while DQ9 doesn't have any styling on the UI (it could just as well be from 1980). But while DQ has a nice little "anywhere analog d-pad", 4H has only 8 directions and you need to touch relative to your character, thus obscuring the screen with your pen at times.
It's interesting that the pinnacle of the DS platform is super traditional oldschool RPGs... but I like it!
eobet on
Heard the proposition that RIAA and MPAA should join forces and form "Music And Film Industry Association"?
edit: Also, this game is great. I can't believe no one is talking about it.
If I wasn't addicted to EO3 I'd be on this game like a fly on shit, believe me. It just looks glorious, the art direction is beautiful, and the gameplay looks plenty entertaining. But, the Labyrinth gets priority, I'm afraid. Maybe when I'm done with EO.
Wait, wait, waaaaaaait... because 4H lack mana points, I can't cast Cure between battles??? What did I miss!?
EDIT: And... in combat... I can't use a potion on someone else in the party... or use Cure on someone else in the party? This is confusing...
EDIT: Ok, found the Cure tome in the inventory and tried to use it... nothing happens... utterly confused now.
Heal spells are "smart". They heal the lowest HP member that isn't at full health. Potions are character-specific.
The Cure tome can only be used if the character has enough AP out of combat. AP carries over between battles. This is good info when you're about to face a boss. Knock out some baddies to fill up AP, and when you start the fight and everyone is psyched up, nail 'em hard!
JeanHeartbroken papa bearGatineau, QuébecRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
Snatched up FF IV DS for $5
Nice remake overall. The one thing that bugs me is the very high encounter rate.
Jean on
"You won't destroy us, You won't destroy our democracy. We are a small but proud nation. No one can bomb us to silence. No one can scare us from being Norway. This evening and tonight, we'll take care of each other. That's what we do best when attacked'' - Jens Stoltenberg
Confirmed: They fixed the healing AI. My black mage was at 57 HP (roughtly 80%), my Bandit was at 60 (Roughly 50%), and the whitemage healed the bandit.
Wait, they fixed it? Since your last post, the developers have patched the game to make the healing AI not suck?
Wait, wait, waaaaaaait... because 4H lack mana points, I can't cast Cure between battles??? What did I miss!?
EDIT: And... in combat... I can't use a potion on someone else in the party... or use Cure on someone else in the party? This is confusing...
EDIT: Ok, found the Cure tome in the inventory and tried to use it... nothing happens... utterly confused now.
Heal spells are "smart". They heal the lowest HP member that isn't at full health. Potions are character-specific.
The Cure tome can only be used if the character has enough AP out of combat. AP carries over between battles. This is good info when you're about to face a boss. Knock out some baddies to fill up AP, and when you start the fight and everyone is psyched up, nail 'em hard!
Hmm... I'm just in the beginning of the game, but how do I get AP left over from combat?
Also... does "smart" include targeting? The main problem I have with DQ9 combat (and nearly ALL of JRPG combat) is... [fuck, I'm too tired to think of an example... but it's like this: You most powerful character gets to hit a monster last and thus wastes his powerful punch on a weakened monster, instead of hitting the strongest monster... I think it happens a lot after a monster "unexpectedly" dies when planning turn based battles... shit, not even that makes sense... I need sleep.]
A chest just turned into a Mimic... Ultima IV nostalgia overdose... all confusion regarding 4H is forgiven, I will fully embrace this new system.
PS. One final question before I turn in: I thought having full AP meant getting "strong fire", but it wasn't. It appears totally random to me, but what really controls it?
eobet on
Heard the proposition that RIAA and MPAA should join forces and form "Music And Film Industry Association"?
Posts
It actually plays a LOT like NES era Dragon Quest or maybe Final Fantasy games.
Still though, I really do like the game. There's just something deliciously charming about it, and I'm also one of the few people who actually like this art style.
Or, you could just use Steiner and cast Shock, or reflect-2x Flares from Vivi, or the aforementioned MP Attack with the Ultima Weaopon. I guess you could use Limit Glove too, but meh.
But what about gameplay? All I know is there's hats that are jobs and auto-targeting. How does it all work? Do you upgrade the jobs or is it more FF3 where you just have everything you'll ever have with them? How do battles go beyond auto-targeting? And also anything else that's important.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
You upgrade the crowns (hats) using gems that are dropped at random by enemies. Gems are also your primary source of money, as well as the way you upgrade gear. So it's a balancing act -- do you get rid of gems for money, do you upgrade gear, or do you upgrade your crown for a new ability?
Crowns have 4 levels (0, 1, 2, 3) and each one adds a new ability, and is harder to unlock. Abilities are only usable by the crown they come from -- no unlocking steal then switching away from the Bandit Crown, for example. You get new crowns by hitting parts of the story, as well as some secret ones you get from bonus dungeons and minigames.
Yes, the game uses auto-targeting. Attacks either hit the front or rear row (swords are front, spears are back, etc), and the game will be semi-intelligent when attacking -- your team will gang up on one target, for example. Beneficial spells are the same way -- your white mage will hit the most hurt target automatically.
There is an auto-battle system, which allows you to select a move with each person then watch as they do it. It's mostly useful for random battles, as it's very fast. What I typically do is have one character as a white mage and the other attacking. When I get back to a full party, it will likely be 2 guys stealing/searching for gems, 1 attacking, 1 curing.
Magic is class independent. As long as you're holding a magic book, you can cast. White / Black mages get bonuses to the respective stat, self-chargeup abilities, and a discount to the AP cost to cast spells.
AP is the turn system, and is kinda sorta nothing like SMT's system. Every turn you get 1 AP. You can boost (defend) to avoid spending one. Spells, for example, require 2 AP, so you have to wait a turn between casting... unless you're a white / black mage. There's higher level spells -- Fira, for example, is 3 AP, not 2. Ethers restore AP in this. There is no Mana system.
All in all, this game feels like it could have been a NES Final Fantasy game, with 3d graphics similar to the FF3/FF4 DS ports.
Buy it.
However as I recall there is some dispute as to how good a job this does. You could have a warrior with tons of HP and really high defense, able to take a few more hits, and then a thief with just a couple HP who is near death, but the WM decides to heal the warrior because he's missing 300 HP instead of 100.
Or perhaps it was vice versa, and it goes on percentage of HP missing, which could still get you in trouble. Either way, has this been a problem for you 4H players?
Also, you guys say that it's really fast to punch in your attacks, but how fast is the battle system in general? Are there little cutscenes of the enemies flying in, and each attack has a 3 second lead time, and slow unskippable victory dances?
Anyway, as far as I can tell, it heals the target with the lowest current HP. So say you have:
Tank: 99/100 HP
White Mage: 69/70 HP
Bandit: 70/90 HP
The white mage gets the heal. But that's ok, since the other two won't be in any danger of dying due to damage (whereas the white mage very well may be). And these are all theoretical numbers, as my characters are all +/- 20 HP with each other right now.
I understand it gets harder later, but, right now, not an issue.
BUY IT.
About as fast as your average SNES FF game, maybe faster. Dragon Quest this ain't. Shit gets done. You swing, numbers pop up, enemy does a brief spin, more numbers pop up. Somebody does an AE attack or cure, it's one giant spell effect and 4 numbers.
There's also a text log on the bottom of the screen narrating the action DQ style, but if I have any complaint, is that the combat maybe moves just a bit too fast for it. Damage numbers only stick around for half a second before the next ones pop up.
So basically, a battle turn goes like this: Tap 1 button for each party member telling them what to do. Battle starts, the party and enemies do their thing, and 5-10 seconds later, you're back in the menu for round 2.
All of the old school Dragon Quest style gameplay, with the speed and brevity of a Final Fantasy game. Hell, this is how the DQ games should be.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
All right, all right, you win. I bought it.
But if I don't like it I fully expect you to apologize.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
So...Lost Odyssey?
I'm game.
Lost Odyssey was a good game, but I would hardly refer to the combat as being fast. Also, it's not anything like FFIX's. It's not ATB, it a has a fairly crucial timing mechanic, and probably some other shit I've forgotten.
Still stuck playing Sazh and Vanille, no potions, no gil to buy potions and stuck in a stupid Eidolon battle. I cant get the gestalt meter to go up quickly with just Sazh and Vanille healing. We die way too fast as Ravager/Ravager. I give up...
I started off liking this game alot, and it was a downhill slide from there.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
EDIT: Yeah, just confirmed it. Every time you buff it counts towards your Gestalt. Just buff up (do you have Haste? It helps a lot!) and then go to town with Rav/Rav. If you need healing drop to Syn/Med or Rav/Med and you should be fine. I think Odin was more tougher than this one but lots of people have trouble here too.
It could be that my lack of a high definition tv is limiting me...
Edit: Also are pheonix downs only droppable off monsters? Do I have to run to an inn everytime I run out?
Yup, they do. They pretty much leave after the next boss fight you have, and only one actually leaves instantly after the fight, so you typically have time to empty their pockets.
If you're looking to play it safe:
Could very well be it. I play on a SD TV as well and have a lot of trouble distinguishing between things Pain and Fog. That plus being a little colorblind and I sometimes can't tell whether I have a buff or its corresponding debuff on me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUD8iVbls2A&feature=related
Chronicles, and less so Anthology and Tactics got the worst of it, I guess.
I liked Origins though! Too bad they're cut off on the PSP
How far we've come...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT12DW2Fm9M
twitch.tv/Taramoor
@TaramoorPlays
Taramoor on Youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKDQa_85n64
No idea why there's such a big difference. I like the part around :45 in the FF4 one when the camera makes a perfect stop and pans away like a first year 3D art student's project.
VI's ending FMV is great
EDIT: That's why 4's is FF7 popeye quality while 6 was at least FF8/9 quality.
DQ9 technically innovates with cel shading on the DS, and 4H has anti-aliasing. Both use a very special color palette to create atmosphere, but 4H takes it to the extreme (including the perspective). 4H also styles their interface to fit, while DQ9 doesn't have any styling on the UI (it could just as well be from 1980). But while DQ has a nice little "anywhere analog d-pad", 4H has only 8 directions and you need to touch relative to your character, thus obscuring the screen with your pen at times.
It's interesting that the pinnacle of the DS platform is super traditional oldschool RPGs... but I like it!
FFIV in 97?? That's Square's first year doing FMV, no wonder it looks that way (without the budget of FFVII same year)
I never thought of it that way, considering we didnt get it till 2001.
If I wasn't addicted to EO3 I'd be on this game like a fly on shit, believe me. It just looks glorious, the art direction is beautiful, and the gameplay looks plenty entertaining. But, the Labyrinth gets priority, I'm afraid. Maybe when I'm done with EO.
EDIT: And... in combat... I can't use a potion on someone else in the party... or use Cure on someone else in the party? This is confusing...
EDIT: Ok, found the Cure tome in the inventory and tried to use it... nothing happens... utterly confused now.
That explains why it felt really weird when I first saw it.
Heal spells are "smart". They heal the lowest HP member that isn't at full health. Potions are character-specific.
The Cure tome can only be used if the character has enough AP out of combat. AP carries over between battles. This is good info when you're about to face a boss. Knock out some baddies to fill up AP, and when you start the fight and everyone is psyched up, nail 'em hard!
The Raid
Nice remake overall. The one thing that bugs me is the very high encounter rate.
Wait, they fixed it? Since your last post, the developers have patched the game to make the healing AI not suck?
Hmm... I'm just in the beginning of the game, but how do I get AP left over from combat?
Also... does "smart" include targeting? The main problem I have with DQ9 combat (and nearly ALL of JRPG combat) is... [fuck, I'm too tired to think of an example... but it's like this: You most powerful character gets to hit a monster last and thus wastes his powerful punch on a weakened monster, instead of hitting the strongest monster... I think it happens a lot after a monster "unexpectedly" dies when planning turn based battles... shit, not even that makes sense... I need sleep.]
PS. One final question before I turn in: I thought having full AP meant getting "strong fire", but it wasn't. It appears totally random to me, but what really controls it?